Walter Tetley
| Walter Tetley | |
|---|---|
.jpg)
Tetley ca. 1940-50
|
|
| Born |
Walter Campbell Tetzlaff June 2, 1915 Manhattan, New York City, U.S. |
| Died | September 4, 1975 (aged 60) Los Angeles, California, U.S. |
| Occupation | Voice actor |
| Years active | 1938–1973 |
Walter Tetley (June 2, 1915 – September 4, 1975) was an American voice actor specializing in child impersonation during radio's classic era, with regular roles on The Great Gildersleeve and The Phil Harris-Alice Faye Show, as well as continuing as a voice-over artist in animated cartoons, commercials, and spoken-word record albums. He is perhaps best known as the voice of "Sherman" in the Jay Ward-Bill Scott Mr. Peabody TV cartoons.
Tetley was born Walter Campbell Tetzlaff to a Scottish-born mother, Jessie Smith Campbell, and father Frederick Tetzlaff who was born in Manhattan of German parents.
Tetley was a precocious performer even when he really was a child, beginning at age seven performing Harry Lauder imitations. He established himself in radio, usually playing smart-aleck kids. Tetley moved to Hollywood in 1938 and acted in a number of films (he is the wisecracking messenger or pageboy in several Universal Pictures comedies), but radio was his truest metier.
Walter Tetley's perennially adolescent voice was the result of a medical condition. While this has been cited as a hormonal problem, one of Tetley's employers, Bill Scott, offered a more specific explanation. According to Scott, Tetley's mother was reluctant to give up the revenue generated from her son's busy radio career and, in Scott's words, "She had him fixed. Walter Tetley, the world's tallest midget." (Pre-puberty castration as a means to further one's voice career was a tactic not seen in Western society since the castrato phenomenon of 18th century Italy.) Whatever the medical reason, the condition arrested Tetley's development, preventing his voice from breaking into maturity as well as preventing his further physical growth. Tetley would sound forever as though he was stranded on the bridge between childhood and teenage adolescence. Combined with his excellent delivery and spot-on comic timing, he parlayed his condition into a radio career that lasted nearly a quarter of a century, with some of radio's biggest stars including Tetley in their shows, including but not limited to Fred Allen, Jack Benny, W.C. Fields and others.
...
Wikipedia